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Slashing education budget will hurt the state's future

Memo to Gov. Rick Scott: You can't get there from here.

Scott claims he wants to create 700,000 jobs in Florida in seven years, which, with a 12 percent unemployment rate, has seen the underpinnings of its economy - agriculture, construction and tourism - crumble beneath the weight of the Great Recession.

To rebuild those underpinnings, the state needs to turn its focus to jobs in research and technology and health; jobs that don't necessarily rely on people being able-bodied but nimble-minded. Which means that now, more than ever, education ought not to be treated as expendable but as essential.

So, what does Scott do? He proposes cutting education spending by $3.6 billion.

That means a 10 percent cut in per-pupil spending for youths in grades kindergarten through 12. And educators throughout the state, and in North Florida, are worried.

According to a Times-Union story, Baker, Clay, Duval, Nassau, Putnam and St. Johns counties are expected to lose $148 million. While officials in those counties expected to lose $70 million of that once the stimulus funds dried up, they didn't see another $78 million in cuts coming.

That means layoffs and less money to pay for the education that youths will need for an economy that relies on strong minds and changes in technology.

It means that the state risks winding up with a work force that will be ill-prepared to take on the higher-skilled, higher-paying jobs that can help rebuild this state's tattered economy and tax base.

It means not funding electives like art and music; subjects that fuel students' imagination and give them insights into different ways to think.

In short, it means we're going in the wrong direction.

Nat Irvin, a futurist and professor of management at the University of Louisville, said that bolstering education needs to be a top priority because the economy of the future will require people to be able to adapt to change.

"Things are getting complicated," Irvin told me. "Policy makers need to understand the extent to which information technology undergirds everything we do ... the future will require abstract thinking."

Shortchanging education isn't the way to go right now, Irvin said, although he also said that improving it won't just require more money as much as it will require new ways of thinking about education.

"What we need right now is imagination," Irvin said. "If you cut something, then you need to replace it with something new."

Something new, Irvin said, doesn't necessarily mean charter schools or vouchers - although he believes such concepts are necessary to disrupt the current way of doing education.

Smaller, more nimble public schools would probably be the way to go, he said.

But it's tough to begin a conversation about redesigning education if that conversation is always beginning with slashes to public schools, or becomes all about charters and vouchers.

That conversation has to begin with a commitment to properly fund education.

That's important - because while businesses may favor low taxes, the businesses that will drive the future economy favor strong public schools and an educated workforce more.

And Scott's proposal to cut billions from an education budget that has been long shortchanged - beginning in the 1990s when Lottery proceeds were used to replace general education funds rather than supplement them - sends a terrible message to prospective companies that could create the thousands of jobs that Scott aims to generate.

No doubt, with a $3.6 billion budget shortfall, cuts are going to have to be made. But when one looks at where the jobs have been lost in Florida, and where the new ones will have to come from, this ought to be a time for visionary measures, not punitive ones.